


Eat Your Heart Out: A Fic Collection

by ameliaspunkcomplex



Category: Hannibal - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - High School, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blowjobs, Cannibalism, Dark Will, Establish Relationship, Fic Collection, Fluff, Hannigram - Freeform, M/M, Murder, au!hannigram, death of a side character, obviously
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-13
Updated: 2015-05-14
Packaged: 2018-02-08 16:29:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1948152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ameliaspunkcomplex/pseuds/ameliaspunkcomplex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of Hannigram prompts I have filled on tumblr. Each chapter is a fic. Warnings change and will be updated as a new fic is added.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Confession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt filled for xzombiexkittenx on Tumblr. I lost the original message but it was along the lines of;
> 
> Hannibal asks Will to run away with him. Will says yes. They confess; Abigail and Freddie are alive. It culminates in angry sex.
> 
> Please excuse my artistic interpretation: I saw this is a cute little lover's tiff. Cannibal lover's tiff.

“A classic Sole Meunière with a parsley and lemon ju,” Hannibal says as he places the dish on the table, filling the room with a warm, aromatic citrus _parfum_. “It’s simple fare tonight, I’m afraid. A patient of mine was insistent on dragging her appointment far over time. I am in the process of referring her to another psychiatrist presently.”

Will shrugs, watching as Hannibal slides a fillet of steamed sole onto his plate.

“It looks far from simple,” he replies, unbuttoning his cuffs so he can roll his sleeves up. “Although you could feed me Mac-n’-Cheese right now and I’d be sated. I’m starving.”

Hannibal almost looks offended. “I’d never abuse you like that,” he says, deadpan as usual. He looks up at Will as he serves himself, taking a seat. “You had a long day too, I assume?”

A sigh escapes the empath, whose fatigue is painted on him vulgarly, in the blue-purple bags he totes under his eyes, the mop of raven hair which hangs thick and unwashed, brushing the rim of his glasses. “It’s not so much the case as Jack,” he says, “he’s strung out over Bella and it’s all coming out on this case. He wants a profile by tomorrow.”

“Wine?” is all Hannibal interjects. Will nods, pushing his glass towards him.

“This woman,” he continues, “she _paints_ with her victims. She takes the bodies, but she leaves these canvases at the scenes – textual pieces, made entirely with the remains.” He pauses, cutting a piece from the fish and letting it melt in his mouth; smooth, buttery fish, balanced by the tart citrus, and both cleansed by the fresh aftertaste of parsley. He’s so hungry he feels almost nauseous, and the moan that escapes him is almost sensual.

“She is honouring her victims,” Hannibal comments, swilling the glass of wine under his nose ritualistically.

“It’s quite beautiful,” Will agrees through a mouthful of food. “The art is actually surprisingly inspiring. She creates such touching scenes with her victims. It’s almost sacred.”

“Hallowed.”

“Indeed.”

Will is suddenly aware that Hannibal is watching him with a studying, almost clinical air; he perks an eyebrow as Hannibal cuts his food into politely bite-sized pieces. Neither comment for a moment.

“Anyway,” Will continues, aware that Hannibal will find him speaking with food in his mouth distasteful, but for once, lacking empathy, “there’s no time to dwell on beauty. Jack’s determination to close this case is bordering on manic. This cancer is stripping his control from him. He seems to feel the need to exercise it tenfold to compensate.”

Hannibal is glancing over Will’s tired lines now, with an expression of faint disgust. His distaste for Jack becomes more thinly masked with every passing day that Will is yet-again sleep and food deprived. Will is sure that did Jack not mean something to him, he would be impaled and bled dry by now. Unable to do so, Hannibal instead takes pleasure in feeding Will up, stealing him when he can and nestling him into the thick, silk sheets. Often, it takes more than the plump pillows to send Will to sleep, but Hannibal doesn’t mind; if anything, he too sleeps much better, longer and deeper, after tangling himself inside and around Will like ivy.

Will can read it all in his eyes, has trained himself to see past the blood-coloured pools, past his own reflection and to the man within. Through the glasses he has fashioned from his scars he can now see the ripples of the usually calm surface, and suspects that there is more Hannibal is not saying. He’s not just angry about Jack overworking him; no, he wears a stranger expression. Something is making him uncomfortable. Will has never seen Hannibal hesitant to speak, but right now he seems strangled by his words.    

“What is it?” he asks, taking a gratuitous gulp from his glass.

Hannibal waves him away. “I want to talk, but it can wait until after dinner.”

When Hannibal shuts down, there isn’t a key in the world to open him up again until he wishes to do so, and Will was never much of a locksmith to begin with.

Of all the things he would like to say, he simply comments,

“This fish _is_ delicious,”

before shoving another forkful into his mouth with a sated grin.

***

Hannibal Lecter isn’t the most affectionate man at the best of times – not outwardly, at least. But Will has found that as the night grows old, Hannibal seems to fall inversely younger; an antithesis of his sun-warmed self, he is sentimental and romantic, much more at ease with touching and being touched, and on good nights, or when he’s loosened and warm with wine, he will sit at the harpsichord and play melodies so obviously written only for Will, each finger to the keys like a kiss against Will’s paper skin. Sometimes Will mourns that nobody but him will ever see this side of Lecter, but he is mainly selfishly dizzied by having this wonderful creature all to himself.

On this night, they are slightly drunk. Will didn’t intend for it to happen, and he suspects Hannibal didn’t either, which concerns him slightly; Hannibal doesn’t take a breath he doesn’t plan. But he’s not going to complain, not now, not when he’s splayed so comfortably over Lecter’s lap while the doctor reads him poetry in his mother tongue, the language so soft and lyrical against his dulled American ears. They are both lost to each other – Hannibal to the poem, and Will to tracing circles against the flesh of Hannibal’s arm and watching goosebumps blossom in his wake – but they are at the same time, so together. The left and right sides of the brain, separately distracted, but piloting the same magnificent flesh.

“All this wine is going to make you soft,” Will teases, poking Hannibal’s belly gently. Hannibal already has a bit of a tummy, natural for a man of his age, but Will loves it, something so appealing about the soft, dappled flesh. He loves Lecter’s hard lines too, the taut pull of his trapezoid, the firm bunch of his strong thighs. He could worship that body for an eternity and a day.

“I indulge with calculation,” Hannibal replies in a hushed whisper. “Now shush. Don’t interrupt me.”

“Sorry,” Will murmurs, smiling into his shoulder. Hannibal falls back into the poetry, and Will really listens to the words for once. He can’t understand a word of it, but the language sounds ancient and regal. Behind the wall of linguistics, there is an abstract sadness to the poem, which weaves its way through Lecter’s tone like the deep bass of a quartet; a melancholy background to the beauty of the words. For seemingly no reason, it makes him think of his childhood autumns in Louisiana, of the crunch of leaves under his feet and the ominous shadow of winter.  He wishes he lived a life that simple again, plagued only by the inevitability of a drafty house and an early sunset. Now winter lives inside him. He tells himself there is summer within Hannibal, but he knows he’s burning himself on candles. Alas, beggars can’t be choosers.

Suddenly, through the haze of wine and the even thicker fog of sentiment, he remembers Hannibal’s comment at dinner.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” he asks abruptly, interrupting Hannibal who clicks his tongue in annoyance.

Sighing, the man underneath him shifts so he can place the book of poetry aside, and sits back in the chair, a tipsy Will lulling against his chest. He is perpetually warm, be it sunlight or fire: Will’s not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

A few moments of comfortable silence pass before Hannibal speaks. When he does, Will wishes the silence has stretched longer.

“How much would you be willing to sacrifice for me, Will?” Hannibal asks.

Will grimaces. “Are we having this conversation? You know plenty about my sacrifices, you _cook_ them.”

Shaking his head, Hannibal sighs again. “No, Will, not those sacrifices. I know that you would carve out a heart for me-”

“Are you going to ask me if I’d carve out my own?” Will interrupts, frankly pissed off that Lecter felt the need to rob him of the moment, although technically, _he asked._

“No, no.” Hannibal presses his face against the crook of Will’s neck and shoulder, lips warm against his skin, usual ivory flushed with an alcoholic blush. “Although I suppose I am asking if you could carve something _from_ your heart.”

“What?”

“Everything. The FBI. Jack Crawford. Alana Bloom. America, maybe.”

He’s making no sense. Will pulls away from Hannibal, spinning around to face him, expecting to see some drunken glaze to his expression but finding his gaze as sharp as ever, two piercing, bleeding pools of light. “What do you mean?” he asks in response, avoiding the answer, although already, he’s flashing people and places through his mind like old clothes; easily discarded, must keep, charity box. Aside from his dogs, he felt no great attachment to Baltimore, but he was more concerned with Hannibal’s logic and the destination he had in mind.

If Hannibal’s gaze was one of his meals, then it would taste smooth and sharp, but have a horridly bitter aftertaste. Was it sadness? It was impossible to tell.

“I want you to leave with me Will,” he says evenly, almost sternly. “I want us to leave this place. I have several places around South America and Europe that we could leave for; I could have plane tickets by tomorrow and we could be gone without a trace come Thursday. It would be painless.”

Will shakes his head in confusion, “But _why_.”

Did tears brim Lecter’s eyes? Or was that the glint of a knife’s edge?

“What’s happened, Hannibal?” he demands, tension starting to constrict his throat, heart thrumming against his brittle ribcage. “Did you leave evidence?”

Hannibal raises his hand, leaves it hanging in the air for a split second before coming to rest against Wil’s neck. It’s an awkward contortion, with Will still sitting on his lap and Hannibal pinned against the armchair. “I have never told you a lie, Will, although I will admit to omitting the truth on occasion. But I only ever have your best interests at heart.”

Words like _gaslighting_ come to mind, along with acidic memories of the year prior. Will bats away their ugly heads as soon as they rear: he’s buried them long ago.

“I know,” he replies, cautiously. “So what have you kept from me?”

 “A terribly beautiful secret. I was going to surprise you, but she’s getting nervous; I don’t think we can wait much longer. If she doesn’t see you soon, she’ll panic, and I dread to think of somebody finding her before you-”

“ _She_?”

Hannibal smiles a weary smile.

“Abigail, Will. She’s alive.”

When Will Graham was six years old, a large bookshelf fell on him, breaking his arm and pinning him to the ground where he remained for a few hours before his father came in from working the garden and found him. He remembers that is wasn’t the pain that scared him – although breaking your arm cleanly in two places is agony – but the feeling of that heavy oak crushing the air from his lungs, shelves pressing against and between his ribs, making each breath a pained, raspy and short lived exercise in futility.

Right now, he feels as though he is back under that bookcase, except his father isn’t in the garden: nobody’s home, and he’ll never be rescued.

“Will,” Hannibal says, pulling him back to shore.

“Abigail,” he whispers, hoarsely.

“Yes.”

As he remembers his body, his flesh, he pushes his limbs away from Hannibal to stand in the middle of the drawing room. Hannibal makes no attempt to hold him back, and makes no comment as Will rats his hands through his hair and pulls tight, pulls until his scalp sears, squeezes his eyes so tightly shut that it hurts, and each breath wheezes from him and sounds like her name, and he could be lying but he’s _seen_ that ember before and it’s hers, realises that was his smell as keen as Hannibal’s he would realise that he could _smell_ her on him, that sweet bonfire smell, like burnt lavender. He doesn’t realise he’s rocking until Hannibal is behind him, large hands wrapped around him, holding Will in a steel grip against his chest.

“Come back,” the doctor whispers. Will does come back, suddenly, with a fist. Hannibal lets it clip his cheek although he probably sees it coming; is that all the punishment he thinks he deserves? Will’s stomach burns with the acidity, and he snarls.

“You could strip me of my flesh and I would call it _art_ Hannibal, but _Abigail?_ ”

“I apologise. I knew you would be upset but I was hoping-”

“Upset?” Will echoes, exasperated, “Life isn’t a balance of moral utility, _Doctor Lecter_. My happiness doesn’t cancel out your evil!”

Hannibal has retreated into safety behind an impermeable stone mask- Will cast the first stone with formality, and Hannibal, in kind, has regressed: it’s as though time hasn’t passed, and Hannibal is simply observing Will in another syphilis-inspired fit of insanity. Will hates him for the parallel, and he will let him know.

“Evil?” Hannibal echoes – they are becoming exasperated shadows of each other’s words – “Abigail means as much to me as she does to you, Will. I was protecting her until the time was right. You were not fit to guard her.”

Will wants to be sick. “A disability brought on by _you_ \- or are we still ignoring that harmless experiment of yours.”

Hannibal blinks with infuriating passivity. “We don’t ignore it. I have countlessly apologised for my methods, but they were necessary for your catharsis. Birth is painful, Will, but creation is inspiring.”

“I don’t have time for your metaphors. Stop hiding behind poetry and _speak_ to me.”

“We are speaking, Will.”

Will stares at Hannibal, who holds the gaze evenly: neither provoking, not defending, a caricature of marble. Six months regress in a heartbeat.

“I want to see her,” Will demands, and that smoky sweet perfume that lingers seems to clog his airways, suffocating him.

Hannibal replies, “I don’t think now is the right time,”

So Will, sobered but dizzied with rage, disappears out the front door and into the night.

***

Hannibal is not shaken. Will, as cryptic as he likes to feel, tattoos his thoughts on his own skin in blood and grit. All elements of himself – the psychiatrist, the predator, the lover – all fragments which when collected, build an image of Hannibal Lecter, had predicted this almost to each laboured breath ghosting over Will’s lips.

“You probably plan your morning piss,” Will had said to him one morning, drunk on sleep. He had chuckled at the time, wondering whether Will knew how correct a statement it truly was.

Meticulous planning was the vaccination for unpleasant surprises. Hannibal had learnt this the hard way, and now held it as his mantra.

At one o’clock in the morning, Hannible hears the front door close, much more quietly than when it had slammed hard just three hours ago: he takes this as a good sign. He puts down his pen, careful not to smudge the fresh ink against the paper with his sleeve, for he had been writing this melody for almost ten months now, and it was starting to fall into place.

“Where did you go?” he asks aloud, sensing Will hovering by the archway.

“There’s a river close to your house.”

“I know it.”

“I wanted to get dirt under my nails so I sat in the banks. Then I wanted to feel something, so I jumped in the river.”

Hannibal turns to look over his shoulder, finding Will quizzically dry. “In your clothes?” he inquired.

“No,” Will says, “I stripped down to my boxers.”

“You’re practically blue, Will,” he says, rising from the harpsichord. He knows Will sees the bruise that’s already formed on his cheekbone, purple, red and blue, like a violent sunset.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t have my psychiatrist with me and I needed something to bring me back. Icy water is definitely effective as a grounding strategy, but I wouldn’t recommend it.”

With clinical precision, Hannibal strides to Will and begins to strip him of his clothes, to which his fiery-eyed protégé does not protest-

“Come,” he says, herding the nude Will Graham towards a bathroom, “Let’s get you to a hot bath. I can’t have you falling ill, not with so many affairs to take care of.”

Will stops in his leaded stride for a second. “Running away; that’s still on the table then?”

Hannibal purses his lips, feeling Will’s resistance ebb from him with each passing second. “It’s the only choice we have if we want to keep each other and Abigail. But I cannot force you to do anything. I’m well aware of you excellence in stubbornness.”

Silent, Will allows himself to be pushed again to the bathroom. It is dark, moonlight reflecting sparingly off the tiles, and now is not the time for candles, so Hannibal turns the lights on and rolls up his sleeves, beginning to draw Will a bath. He checks the temperature consistently, aware that Will’s cold and numbed flesh may not recognise extremes in temperature and not wanting to burn him. He adds to the water a concoction of his own; soothing chamomile bubbles which turn the water creamy and silken. Will tentatively steps in, and immediately melts into the warmth. Hannibal picks up a washcloth, and begins gently rubbing his back.

“Freddie Lounds never died,” Will says loudly, tone unwavering but gaze set straight ahead.

“I know,” Hannibal replies softly, dipping the cloth into the soapy water and moving to work out one the tense knots in Will’s shoulder.

“I smelt her on you the night before Jack almost imprisoned himself. I was convinced you had turned on me.”

Will turns to face Hannibal. “I had,” he says, “Had they not gotten to Jack first, he was going to go ahead with the entrapment, and I was going to help him. We planned to goad you into killing him so as to catch you red-handed.”

Hannibal simply smiles. Perhaps another version of himself – some distant Hannibal with a different combinations of memories and experiences, one who finds beauty in starlight and not still-beating hearts – would run cold at the confession, but he sees only in Will a reflection of himself, slightly distorted as though cast on water. He whispered through the chrysalis, and this brilliant monarch thrived on every word.

“I realised that soon after.”

“Of course you did,” Will scoffs. “So why didn’t you kill me?” He turns around and lulls his neck forwards, allowing Hannibal to work his massaging hands up his neck and the tense, bunched muscle there.

“Because it was excellent,” he replies, dropping the cloth and using his thumbs to knead circles into Will’s flesh, “and I would have done the same. If you recall, I did. You are a brilliant creature crafted from blueprint you drew, and I could not ask for better. And I always had faith that you would come back, Will. We are co-authors of the creature you have become. To be separate would be sacrilege.”

Nobody can miss the shiver that runs up Will’s spine. To question whether it is fear or arousal is futile; the two are a muddy cocktail under this roof.

“Tomorrow, I will take you to see Abigail,” Hannibal continues, “She is in a safe villa a few towns away. She will be ecstatic to see you. But I assure you that we are running on borrowed time. The sooner the three of us leave, the better I can secure our future away from any complications.”

Will nods, body turning serenely pliant under Hannibal’s practiced touch. “My dogs-”

“Will be picked up and waiting for us upon arrival. I can’t have a suit complete without one of your hounds shedding on it, can I?”

The chuckle that reverberates through the other man is the best kind of music.

“Then I’ll leave with you,” Will says, as Hannibal knew he would, “Whenever you want. But let me have a good night’s sleep, Hannibal. I’m exhausted.”

Wrapping his arms around Will’s shoulders, Hannibal places a kiss just under his ear, grazes his jaw with his teeth, sighing against his skin. “I’m afraid I’ll have to rob you of one more night’s rest,” he admits to the hallowed flesh, “we have business to take care of early tomorrow.”

Will pauses, before finishing for him,

“Freddie.”

The doctor smirks against his skin, knows Will can feel the subtle sharpness of his teeth against the vulnerable skin of his throat, those pointed canines a predator’s physiology. He also knows that it excites him, because of the thrumming pulse in his neck, his growing arousal in the shallow bathwater, and because he simply knows Will Graham better than anybody else.

Better than himself.

“I won’t fault your lapse in loyalty,” he whispers soothingly, almost cooing, “but it has created a loose end. I’m sure once Freddie Lounds stops cowering in whatever cesspit she calls a home, she’ll come for me with plenty of ammunition.”

“It will look suspicious,” Will reasons, “If she dies just before we leave.”

“Trust me, Will. I have a plan.”

***

_The Painter: No Need To Panic?_

_The Ohio Painter’s rise to infamy seems to be no cause for concern for the too-cool FBI if recent psychological profiles, leaked exclusively to_ Tattle Crime, _are anything to go by._

_The killer’s modus operates is certainly grotesque enough to make him a name among the most disturbed the Midwest has to offer: butchering his victims obscenely before creating twisted art using their remains, distressing canvases which have been found at every scene. But the FBI don’t seem concerned, with excerpts from his psychological profile suggesting a below average IQ bordering on mental retardation, ‘run-of-the-mill’ history of abuse, and clumsy evidence handling, insinuating that the Painter’s next piece won’t run well with critics. The FBI seem lax, with all notes confident that the evidence in the paintings will be enough to piece together a profile before a new scene emerges. Are these veteran police too used to gore? Has death become just another factor in their daily crossword? Or is the Painter really undeserved of legitimate panic? You’ll be sure to find out here first._

“Mental retardation?” Jack Crawford reads aloud, exasperation drowning his tone. “We haven’t used that phrase for twenty years! Do you think she was trying to bait the killer out?”

_As Will finishes the last sentence, he can’t hide the grin on his face._

_“It’s terrible,” he says to Hannibal. “Her journalism is bad, but this might not pass.”_

_“Trust me,” Hannibal responds, plastic-cased shoes squeaking as he wipes down the floor, “I’ve read many of her articles. It may read as desperate, perhaps that she has no material and a looming deadline, but a page of complete fabrication is not below Freddie Lounds.”_

“I can’t begin to look for logic in Freddie’s thoughts, Jack,” Will replies as some nameless agent comes to bag the laptop for evidence.

“There’s not a single truth in that article,” Jack mutters, almost to himself. “She went off the deep end. I always knew that poison she called journalism would get her killed-”

“But she could have gone with a little more grace,” Will finishes dutifully, “I know Jack.”

_Hannibal, the prodigal artist, has plenty of large canvases laying around- no need for suspicious purchases. Normally head honcho, the doctor is content this time to sit back and watch Will create the art, for despite his technical ability, there is a moving emotive nature to Will’s art that he found elusive in his own pieces. A keen critic would think their Painter had progressed tremendously, he thinks proudly as Will smears blood against the sheet, although hopefully they would not suspect a ghost-painter._

Turning to face the canvas, even the hardened Jack Crawford has to manfully suppress a retch.

“Why the art?” he seems to beg of Will. “There’s so much evidence left at the scenes. Do we have a killer who wants to be caught?”

 _Freddie’s blazing mane takes centre stage, and as such, on a tangent of artistic intuition, Will themes the painting_ red _. Locks of her bottle-red hair form an abstract mass around the middle, framed by the spidery constellation he has built with arteries plucked so carefully from her flesh, with the precision of Hannibal plucking fine bones from the fillet of sole. In the very centre of the canvas is the organ that Will always dreamed of carving from Freddie’s concave chest, and it is still beating when he rips it from its sinewy foundations and begins to stitch it to the canvas._

“She doesn’t want to get caught,” Will disagrees, studying the painting with a furrowed brow, “She wants to honour her victims. She thinks the human form is ugly; she feels that she is promoting them by making them into masterpieces.”

_They hang the canvas together above the fireplace and it feels twistedly domestic. When the scene is clean enough to avoid recognition, but calculatedly messy enough to be the Painter’s, Hannibal places the liver inside a small esky and rinses his gloved hands once more for measure. When he gazes into Will’s eyes, he sees them midnight black, swallowed up by pupils diluted large enough to eclipse the sun, and in a lapse of procedure, the share a hungry, metallic kiss._

Jack turns away from the painting, clearly shaken. Despite Freddie’s pest-like presence, her loss clearly strikes a chord, and his next words are thick.

“I want a report tomorrow, Will. Let’s close this.”

 _Tomorrow, I’ll be far away,_ Will thinks, waiting until he is far away from the crime scene and buttoning up his coat before he lets the grin flourish.

***

The night after Will returns from the crime scene, he is high on adrenaline and seeks Hannibal out the second he closes the door behind him. Hannibal is doing some mundane mison plus – prepping carrots – but he places the knife neatly down when he sees Wills thundery gaze, hungry and primal.

Will makes a point of tearing through Hannibal’s suit. He likes the way the soft fabric tears in his hands, and intends to pull Hannibal apart in the same manner, splayed, like a naked nerve ending. Hannibal, usually in charge of their encounters, is enthralled with this demanding predator, and lets Will set the pace.

Each kiss is starved and seems to leave Will more and more empty, so he dives into the hollow of Hannibal’s throat, nipping at the thin skin there are leaving bruises in his wake to match the one under his eye, leaving spots of blood above his collarbone and on his teeth, which Hannibal laps up in another fierce kiss. Will kisses him until somebody’s lips are bleeding – whose is undiscernible, but the metallic tang goes straight to Will’s cock. He presses his body flush against Hannibal’s, trying to simultaneously undress them, and push up against Hannibal’s arousal, which when Will pulls his boxers down, is full and flushed, beading a sticky pool against his stomach. Hannibal thinks that Will’s mouth around him is the closest man will get to paradise, until Will pries himself open and sinks down, slicked-up, onto Hannibal and begins to move. Then Hannibal shifts his paradigm and decides that _Will_ is the closest man will get to paradise. Then, Hannibal simply stops thinking, as does Will, the both of them flushed and panting. Will digs his nails into Hannibal’s thigh, gouging crevasses in the man beneath him who is pulling his neck taut as he pushes his head hard back into the mattress, mouth slack and lips bruised.

When heat begins to bundle in Will’s stomach, he forces himself to slow down. “You, Abigail and I,” he hisses, “We’ll leave it all.”

Hannibal open his eyes, and they too are practically swallowed black by his swollen pupils.

“I’ll eat the heart of anybody who tries to stop us.”

When climax finds Will, he bites hard into the soft meat of Hannibal’s shoulder to hold back the cry, pulling the other over the edge too; Hannibal’s orgasm is silent, dies in his throat as he chokes, the pain in his shoulder searing through the pleasure in the pit of his gut, but not detracting from the bliss an inch.

“I’m counting on it,” Will whispers into Hannibal’s ear, collapsing on him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a deviation from canon. For this fic, assume the following:  
> 1) Ya know when that guy crawled out of the horse and then Hannibal called Will a butterfly and we all thought they were gonna kiss? Well, they did.  
> 2) Jack Crawford got arrested for entrapment before he could get to Hannibal's house. Jack was cleared of all charges, but not before Will decided where his loyalties lied (hint: it isn't with the world's worst FBI detective).  
> 


	2. Compromises.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Basically PWP. Tumblr user dyamondblack feels there is too little bottom!Hannibal in the world. I concur wholeheartedly. Now we just have to ask Hannibal...

They eat dinner in contented silence. Will has provided the meat: a ‘venison’ steak carved from the imperious meat of a valet attendant with bad posture and an attitude like soured milk. She had scratched the Bentley and apologised without good grace, attempting to shrug the compensation onto her managers. Hannibal is right in suggesting that Will feels righteous holding the scythe of death: he feels like God as her blood pools thick in the brambles. Benevolent Will strikes her down, and malevolent Hannibal rebirths her with a beauty she never attained in life. Thus is the cyclical nature of being.

“Have you considered my proposal?” Will asks politely, watching Hannibal over the rim of his glass. The other man does not look up to meet his gaze, replying simply,

“I had already agreed,”

before returning to his food. He meticulously cuts his meals into bite-sized pieces. The habit sits on the border between polite society and obsessive compulsion, a brilliant irony is the psychiatrist.

“No,” Will replies patiently, “you said you would do whatever I wanted as long as it brought me pleasure. I was asking you if you would _enjoy_ letting me take you, not whether you felt _obligated._ ”

Will feels bad about the arousal that stirs in his gut at the sight of Hannibal’s prominent Adam’s apple bob in his throat – mainly because the swallow is an uncomfortable and impatient one. But despite Lecter’s claims to the contrary, Will is, at the end of the day, only a man, and he can’t help the images that come to mind of Hannibal’s head snapped back, tendons in his neck pulled taut as Will runs tongue and teeth across that sensitive swell, feeling Hannibal’s pulse in his mouth-

Hannibal clears his throat and Will waves away his daydream. “I cannot promise that I would enjoy being penetrated,” he says, with that annoying, clinical stoicism that he retreats behind when he feels uncomfortable, “but as I have already stated, I will abide anything that makes you happy.”

A grimace sours Will’s expression

\- “You’ll _abide_ me fucking you?” he echoes. “That’s not exactly stellar pillow talk, Hannibal.”

“You would prefer I lied to you?”

 _Oh, he’s milking it,_ Will thinks with a pang of annoyance, noting Hannibal’s impatient flaring of nostrils and tight-lipped expression. “Never,” he says, “I’m only asking that you trust me. You might like it, Hannibal.”

Hannibal has a face like a petulant child, but Will knows he’s about to give in. “A compromise,” Hannibal offers. “Let me take you out tonight. You’ll let me dress you, and you shan’t whine to me about money spent. It would be pleasant to be allowed to properly treat you, for once.”

“Most people wouldn’t consider that a fair trade,” Will points out, before adding, “and I never _whine_.”

“You do like to fret about things I can easily afford,” Hannibal replies. “And this is my pleasure, Will. I see the trade off as perfectly equal.”

Will can see why Hannibal’s has asked for this as his side of the bargain: he’s already squirming at the thought of a three-piece suit, of wine bottles that cost more than his first car and high society darlings who can pick him out as mismatched faster like arrogant bloodhounds. But then he remembers his request – to know Hannibal’s flesh like he knows his, to dig a grave inside the other and bury himself deep - and already the slight tenting of his corduroys has spoken for him. Hannibal eyes his half-erection with wicked bemusal, taking it as a cue to clean up dinner and lead Will to a walk-in closet upstairs.

He really shouldn’t be surprised that Hannibal has had him suits tailor-made, but he can’t help but feel irritated that Hannibal knew he’d bend so easily, and especially to something so base.

As Hannibal piles waistcoats on his arm and begins to hold ties up against Will’s cheek, the empath states dryly,

“Why can’t I help but feel that you orchestrated this fantasy of mine just to guilt me into a suit?”

and the shadow of a smirk he gets is answer enough.

***

 Leaving the restaurant, Will begins to think he is too exhausted for anything more demanding than sleep right now, and that perhaps this was Hannibal’s intention. He wouldn’t blame him: he entered this relationship knowing fully well that the man sitting beside him had a silver tongue and a way with manipulation. These were primary facets of Hannibal’s personality that he would be foolish to try and tear down.

“You can’t tell me you had not a second of fun,” Hannibal says, glancing away from the road briefly to register Will’s expression. He might look grumpy or ungrateful, but he’s neither; just drained.

“I enjoyed myself,” he insists, “although I don’t see why we would pay so much money for food subpar to your own cooking.”

The doctor smiles. “I thank you for the backhanded compliment, but you’re forgetting that the purpose of an outing is to be free of duty and responsibility. As much as I love cooking, I also appreciate an occasional night off. It’s a small pay off that their produce is subordinate. They don’t have keen hunters at hand like I do.”

It’s so obviously meant to compliment Will, but he grins anyway. Hannibal has a way of spreading his affection thinly enough that each word of praise falls weighty and plated gold on his conditioned ears. He feels uneasily like Pavlov’s dog, but once again, the insight doesn’t alter his reaction. Now, Hannibal’s left hand has left the steering wheel – no concern for the concentrated driver – and is resting heavily just above Will’s knee, tantalisingly close to the sensitive skin of his thigh. All complaints of fatigue flush from his body as he rocks forward, trying without success against the seatbelt to push Hannibal further up. He is frustratingly immobile, giving Hannibal all the control: his hand ghosts up painful inch by painful inch, until the seatbelt is cutting tight into Will’s stomach as he desperately keens forward. Only two nights in his own bed have left him this undone: he’s beginning to worry that he won’t last long enough to claim his end of the deal.

Suddenly, the car stills and Hannibal snatches his hand away, which had been maliciously close to Will’s quickly filling crotch. Frustrated, Will tears his seatbelt off and leaves the car door. The bracing air is making him flag already, the suit slightly too thin for such unforgiving weather – but from the cruel twinkle in Hannibal’s eye, he senses this problem is short lived.

Hannibal started the fire before they left, and as Will closes the doors shut behind him he is greeted by a wall of warmth that seeps quickly into his chilled bones as he strips first the waistcoat, and then fiddles with his tie, flinging it over the coatrack. The crackle of firewood is one of his favourite sounds, second only to those he plans to draw from Hannibal.

Speak of the devil and he shall appear; think about making him moan, and apparently he’ll sneak up behind you and start to unbutton your dress shirt with those long, slender fingers of his that drive you so crazy. Hannibal is far more turned on than he’s letting on - his own sensuality something Will has discovered he almost considers a weakness – but there’s no denying the hard line of Hannibal’s cock pressing through his trousers and against Will’s ass as the taller man presses wet, open-mouthed kisses to the nape of his neck. For a moment, Will wants to forget the tradeoff, beg Hannibal to fuck him up against the wall right there, as violent and desperate as he feels. He shakes his head clear as Hannibal snakes sneaky hands to the loop of his belt.

“You’re uncharacteristically wanton tonight,” Will breathes as his belt falls to the floor.

“Are you complaining?”

“Hardly.”

With his shirt free from his trousers, Hannibal snakes cool hands up Will’s stomach, through the light hair of his chest, ghosting briefly over a swollen nipple before coming to rest against his throat, a light throttle that doesn’t restrict Will’s air, but leaves him dizzied nonetheless.

“I was thinking,” whispers Hannibal, “of your proposal, and I am beginning to see the appeal. I want you to open me up like your victims, Will. Bleed me dry.”

Will shivers, and it’s not just the icy digits at his jugular. This is hardly the first time they’ve muddied dirty talk with murder talk, and the vision of Hannibal in a halo of his own blood, skin snow-white and lips ashen makes Will’s cock twitch.

“Although I have to admit… the suit was a contributing factor.”

With that, Will chokes out a strangled sentence that sounds almost like

- _bedroom, upstairs,_

and the two of them takes an eternity to climb the stairs, stopping to ravage each other’s lips almost every few steps. Hannibal, whose sensitivity towards his own strength has fled him with the rest of his prohibitions, smacks Will’s head against the wall so hard at one point that he thinks he can feel sticky blood matt his hair as the other paints his collarbones bruised with sharp lovebites along his clavicle. Will ignores the small wound: he is not made of china. Hannibal certainly doesn’t seem to think so either, manhandling Will into the main bedroom and pushing him down onto the plush sheets.

“Wait,” Will pants, a moment of clarity advising him to savour the moment. Hannibal is a picture standing above him, wide-eyed and breaths ragged, two buttons torn from his fine shirt and lost on the stairs. “Strip,” he commands, “slowly.” He would normally be tentative to shift the power dynamic, Hannibal so set in his role, but the man before him simply flicks his tongue out over his swollen lips, beginning to remove his clothes painfully slowly. He seems to spend an eternity on each fiddly button of his cuffs, keeping Will on edge his way of retaining a shred of dominance; trust Hannibal to turn a situation so delightfully to his advantage. By the time Hannibal is fully naked, having neatly folded his clothes and placed them to one side, Will is panting like he’s run a marathon. Hannibal isn’t much better, but he seems to have regained a little control.

Will lets himself appreciate the flesh for a moment. The moonlight seems to love Hannibal Lecter: silvery rays catching the sharp edge of his high cheekbones and strong jaw, aristocratic beauty made only more princely by the light. His body is taut and lean, skin almost entirely unblemished and sun-kissed golden-brown. Even in the dark, his eyes glitter, that dark chestnut flecked with maroon. He is Michelangelo’s David, he is a God. Thoughts of Hannibal crucified come to mind; the strangely pious image makes Will impatient. He discards his own clothes in a series of swift, fluid motions, before standing to press himself against Hannibal and smash their lips together again.

The feel of naked skin on naked skin is almost too much. Will feels like a bared nerve ending, feeling each follicle, each particle of theirs slide together as they set a slow-burning rhythm, hips rocking against each other in search of sweet friction. Will manoeuvres Hannibal towards the bed, laying him down softly, and clambering over him, not breaking the kiss except for Hannibal to mutter into his mouth-

“Second draw down.”

One of Will’s legs is between Hannibal’s own splayed, and the doctor is already rutting against him with abandone, leaving a silvery trail of precum on his thigh. Will feels for the lubs, finds the small, cool tub, and pops the lid off, coating his fingers generously. Breaking the kiss, he presses his lips instead just under Hannibal’s jaw, who gets the message and tips his head back so Will can mouth a trail down his throat to flick his tongue against a pert nipple. Hannibals shudders under him, and Will understands the beauty of breaking something magnificent apart.

“Okay?” he whispers, and Hannibal rocks up against him again in response. Moving to gently teeth the other nipple, he pushes a slicked finger into Hannibal and stills.

He lets him adjust for what feels like forever. For a moment, the only sounds are their laboured breaths echoing of the empty walls. Then Hannibal attempts to stir Will by grinding down on him, so Will adds a second digit and begins to slowly work him open. Hannibal is grimacing and a light sheen of sweat has sprung up on his forehead, but his cock is still thick and leaking and he’s still rutting up against Will. Will, surprised but hardly disappoints, stores the observation for later, wondering if he’s yet to coax from Lecter a secretive masochist.

When Will’s fingers brush over the swollen bundle of nerves, Hannibal lets out an uncharacteristic whimper.

“Good, isn’t it?” Will says, smirk evident.

“You, please,” Hannibal replies through gritted teeth. Will’s reasoning dies in his throat at the sight of the man below him, so pliant and beautifully broken, and he quickly adds a third finger, finding the angle which lets him ghost over Hannibal’s prostate on every other stroke. By the time he rolls on a condom and slicks himself up – they’re both clean, but Hannibal is still both meticulous, and a doctor – Hannibal is completely undone.

“This feels different,” Will warns him gently, guiding his cock to Hannibal’s slick entrance, “I’ll go slow.”

He pushes in just an inch and has to consciously restrain himself from slamming into the lithe body all the way and taking everything: the sensation is overwhelming, parasitic in that it drinks from him every coherent thought and leaves only the drunk mantra, _hottightperfect_. When Hannibal has adjusted, he starts to squirm again, and Will slams home harder than he’d planned, bottoming out and busying himself with cooing into Hannibal’s ear and licking the sweat from his jaw, salty and sweet, so as not to lose himself to the feeling. Hannibal looks slightly pained, but it’s only the faintest of creases that furrows his brow: every other feature that Will has come to recognise on a blissed-out Hannibal is evident, from the glazed eyes, smooth and warm like coffee; the vein that stands obvious in his taut neck; the blood he is drawing from own his lips as he bites down hard, probably suppressing some brilliant noise that Will wants to fill the house with. Next time, he thinks.

He draws almost fully out of Hannibal before rocking back in and does this slowly, a few times, before alternating between lazy, deep rolls of his hips that leave Hannibal scrambling for handholds, which he gouges himself in Will’s shoulders blades – and hard, punishing strokes that bump his cockhead against Hannibal’s prostate with every stroke, drawing strangled moans from deep within both of their throats.

Will is close; he can feel the edges of his vision turn silver and then white, but doesn’t want to come before Hannibal out of courtesy, so he wraps a hand around Hannibal’s neglected cock and pumps him in time with each stroke, grazing his palm over the sensitive head and using the steady stream of precum as lubricant.

It doesn’t take long. A good minute, and Hannibal is turning to jelly under him, a guttural growl building in his throat. He clamps down around Will’s cock as he comes beads of glistening pearl over Will’s hand and his own stomach, and the pressure, as well as the fact that Will’s been holding out for what feels like forever, sends him over the edge of that glorious cliff. He pulls out of Hannibal quickly – a bad idea on reflection, but discomfort soon leaves the other man’s features – and hastily ties off the condom, stroking himself twice before his own ejaculate joins the sticky mess between them that they’re neither too hasty to deal with, not as they both sink, Hannibal into the mattress, and Will into Hannibal’s chest. There they lay for a stretching eternity, panting, Hannibal’s heart thrumming violently against Will’s forehead. Will, who presses tiny kisses to Hannibal’s ribs, too tired to spill praise.

For almost twenty minutes, they lie in silence, until Hannibal rouses them in insistence of a shower. Will joins him, although his limbs feel like jelly, and he’s not the one who just got fucked into the mattress: he commends Hannibal’s manful stride to the ensuite.

They wash each other down, the shower warm-bordering-on-scalding, but their shattered bodies not noticing or not caring.

“Okay, we have to try that again sometime,” Will breathes, squeezing shower gel into his hand so he can massage it into Hannibal’s back.

“Certainly,” Hannibal replies, before adding, “I’ll make an appointment with my tailor for Friday.”

Will groans dramatically, although he is starting to feel as though Hannibal is cheating himself with this deal. He’s happy to wear a suit of nettles if it means pulling Hannibal apart so brilliantly. Like a child, he shatters the snowglobe just to see its insides, and is content to find that his hypothesis is correct: the glass only distorts the image. The contents spilled are so much more beautiful.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do all of your fics end in post-coital bliss, Amelia? demand the people. 
> 
> Yes, I reply, yes, they do. Stop acting like you don't love it.


	3. Sentimentality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from Tumblr has been lost to the wind but was along the lines of:
> 
> AU where Hannibal lives on Will's childhood road. Fast-forward to adulthood and Will is still living in the same house and is surprised to see Hannibal again, but wonders what happened to Mischa.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy, y'all! As always, feedback is greatly appreciated. I'm currently taking prompts again. See notes at the end for my tumblr and gmail accounts :)))

Will is not so much a boy as a glass ornament. His skin is pale bordering on iridescent; the flesh of his wrists like rice paper over his blue-green veins. He always has splinters under his skin and has broken three bones by his sixth birthday. His gaze is fluttering and avoidant, and his eyes are two ethereal pools, reflecting light that doesn’t exist, collecting shadows that don’t exist. When he gazes through you, irritation prickles your skin like stinging nettles. When he looks at you, the nettles seem to grow from within. Neither is comfortable. People find difficulty finding a preference, and as such, generally avoid the child. Will Graham doesn’t mind this: having spent his formative years being carted in and out of various doctor’s offices like carry-on luggage, he is content with finally being left to his own devices. His early childhood is a discordant orchestra of _obsessive, anxious, autistic_ or _just plain insolent,_ depending on who you consult. As children do, he has melted his memories of each doctor into one man: silver-haired, swathed in suffocating cologne, a garish tie fixed below the fold of skin which dangles from his neck and reminds young Will of a Thanksgiving turkey. He remembers very little of these appointments, other than occasionally having his small chin grabbed and yanked to-and-fro, an attempt to tear his uninterested gaze from the colourful blocks in the corner. At seventy dollars a consult, his parents eventually relent, and leave him to his own devices. Then, just as the leaves begin to fall, Hannibal moves in next door.

Will watches the removal trucks through his blinds, trying to snatch glimpses of the new family. Later that day, when it is so cold that only insensible children, and animals, will go outside, he puts on his coat and goes to the garden, clambering on top of the shed to peer over the brick wall separating the two houses.

He is vaguely aware that Edna used to live here – an old lady with a toothless smile, whom his father would make him help carry shopping bags in winter. Secretly, Will hated her, because her wrinkled hands looked like gloves and she smelt of disinfectant. He wonders where she has gone, although he suspects that she is dead. All he knows about death is that you’re not supposed to talk about it, so he doesn’t ask anyone.

“Hallo.”

A small boy is peering up at him curiously. Will brushes his hands, painted red with brick-dust, on his equally filthy knees and stares down.

“Hello,” he says, “do you live here?”

The boy looks like he has been crafted with fine porcelain. His skin is alabaster and his cheeks a warm pink, like the paintings of children on old biscuit tins. He glances back towards the house – perhaps wondering whether or not he should talk to this feral person scaling the brickwork – and then nods up at Will.

“Yes. My name is Hannibal. What’s yours?”

Will makes a sour face. “That’s not a real name,” he replies.

Hannibal scowls. “It is,” he insists, “Hannibal Lecter.”

“Do you have a nickname?” Will asks. “My name is William but everybody calls me Will.”

Hannibal shakes his head, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his navy-blue coat. “Papa says it’s distasteful.” Will doesn’t know what that means.

“I have to go inside,” Hannibal says, “It’s time for supper. Would you like to play outside tomorrow?”

Will just nods, gaze fixed on the polished shoes of the boy who is even smaller than him and who talks with a strange, foreign thickness. Without saying goodbye, he clambers down off of the wall, scraping up his hands in the process, and runs indoors. His dad is making gumbo tonight, and it’s not to be missed.

**

Will meets Mischa the next day. She is a timid, mouse-like girl with the same soft skin and rosy cheeks. Both children are smaller than Will, which he likes, but both has piercing, curious gazes, which he dislikes more than most, and so makes a more vehement effort to avoid.

**

The winter grows darker and the snow thicker. Hannibal has wordlessly assumed the role of Will’s surrogate brother and protector, and Will slips fluidly into the fold beside Mischa.

Will’s parents work twelve-hour days and are too exhausted to speak when the three of arrive home to the premature, grey-faced sunset.

Hannibal’s parents run a business, and leave the children with numerous nannies, who are usually teenagers interested in little other than their cheque at the end of the day or week.

And so the band of ruffians look after themselves (and each other). Sometimes they play intricate imaginary games, like House or War; other times they simply chase each other through the sleet and throw snowballs at each other, primarily made of sludge and twigs, which are actually quite violent weapons with a tendency to leave angry, red welts on the frostbitten skin of the victim. The boys think it’s more exciting that way, but Mischa, who is generally the victim, desperately wishes for some fluffier snow to fall. In the meantime, she uses her slight stature and light feet to creep up on the elder two, and shove ice down their hoods and trousers. Most days, the street is so silent that her nervous giggles – followed by angered but playful declarations of war – seem to echo off the concrete, and stretch forever.

**

Spring means life. In the Lecter’s garden, a palette of colours spring to life. Will’s favourite are the bluebells; Mischa likes a patch of pink flowers that look like little hearts. Hannibal suggests dry-pressing them, and so the children collect petals and leaves from the garden, dry them out in the newborn sun, and press them between the thick pages of a leather-bound book Hannibal stole from his father.

Wherever there is grass, daddy-long-legs’ thrum in thick clouds. Will and Hannibal catch the odd creatures in their hands and release them at Mischa, who once in her panic, pushes her older brother into a pile of stinging nettles.

When Hannibal stands up, blinking, normally iridescent skin painted red-blotchy with welts, Will and Mischa laugh so hard that tears join the morning dew of the wild grass.

**

By summer, the snow is long gone and the children have taken instead to climbing the trees in the back of Hannibal and Mischa’s garden. In the apple trees, they pick the reddest, sweetest fruit and munch happily in the shade of the branches, teasing Mischa with the little grubs and beetles they occasionally find in the ripe flesh and under the leaves, dangling the creatures in front of her face and making her squeal. In the grand oak trees, they tear up their knees and palms trying to climb as high as possible. This scared Mischa at first, but with the boys help she learns how to feel for footholds, and before long she’s looking out over the street with them, feeling like a bird.

Hannibal shows the other two how to shoot a home-made slingshot with such precision that they can hit next-door’s tabby with a rock from a whole yard away. Surprisingly, when Mischa expresses a wish to make daisy chains, Hannibal also shows them how to slit the stems with their teeth and thread the delicate flowers through one another. Mischa’s attempts are clumsy and she frustrates herself, so the boys make her a necklace, crown and anklets from the posies and declare her Queen of the Fairies. She wears them until they rot.

**

The autumn of the first year is a time of change; not just for the leaves, which turn from verdant to golden, to scarlet to brown and then to ash, under their feet, but for the children too.

September means returning to school, or for Mischa, the anxious first day. The shadows cast by the low sun on the first of the month are the shadows that that Autumn casts on the rest of their lives. Will starts to understand why he attends the public school, with its cracked-brick exterior and halls whistling with wind, and Hannibal attends the boy’s grammar school some blocks away. He’s too young to be bitter, jealous or embarrassed, but he starts to become more and more aware of the sheen polish to Hannibal’s leather shoes, in contrast to the scuffed toes of his own sneakers. He watches Hannibal and Mischa pile into the car to be chauffeured to school as he walks the thirty minutes to the bus stop. These things are yet to gain significance, but they weren’t even _things_ before, and they sit uncomfortably.

In the afternoons, they meet up in the garden as they always have, but something – unnamed, but suffocatingly present - has changed. Will teaches them the game conkers with those that have fallen from the Lecter’s tree, and they play half-heartedly until Hannibal leaves for swimming training and Mischa shuffles awkwardly inside after him. Swimming, soccer, music lessons, gymnastics, ballet and choir: these things start to eat away at what little time they have left to play together and Will finds himself more and more often tucked away in his room, on the fraying armchair by the window, glancing miserably over the top of his books at the empty garden.

**

Age brings problems. Age is an acquired taste. Childhood is an apple, juicy and ripe, but adolescence is a cider: it sits bitter in the mouth the first few tastes, and one can only wonder how such a ripe fruit becomes this cynical drink.

Hannibal finds that the more friends he has of his own age

\- and he has many, being an affluent and popular boy with a cheeky kind of charm and an intelligent sense of humour,

\- he feels more and more silly playing imaginary games with his baby sister and immature Will. Will’s instant reaction to this hesitance is to shut Hannibal down completely, to feign utter disinterest, and to an extent, Hannibal’s decision had been made for him. It’s an unfortunate mechanism that Will learns at his own school, where the boys are more brutish and have plenty to say about this thin legs and porcelain skin.

As they enter adolescence, Hannibal – now tall and broad-chested, broad-shouldered, no longer the impish little boy – and Will, the boy who is neither like nor disliked, for his existence is noted only when he opens his mouth and out spills poetry that makes him seem alien, too old – never speak. Mischa sometimes pokes her head through over the wall but Will offers her little more than a stilted smile and, her tender young esteem fractured, she doesn’t try again. Hannibal is still her big brother, still her protector, but in a more domineering, paternal way; she misses the equally-footed fraternity that paints her young, dream-like memories.

And then, just as quickly as Hannibal and Mischa are thrown into Will’s life, they are sharply snatched away. When Will turns fourteen, he stops peeking over the wall when he thinks nobody is looking, because it belongs to a man with an angry dog that barks at him if he tries to scale the brick.

***

Will Graham has lived in his childhood house his whole life. His parents are long-gone, his father dead and his mother retired and content to solitude – perhaps that’s where he gets it from – but he isn’t alone. The house is never silent, for the pitter-patter of too-long claws on padded paws, that soft melody like rainfall that reminds him he needs to groom the dogs.

His pack, like a boy band, has been almost entirely renewed since its formative years, aside from an old Irish wolfhound called Bessie who has achy bones and yellowed teeth. She reeks to high-heavens and gives the house a vaguely rancid odour, but he’ll still be inconsolable when it comes time to put her down.

It has had some renovations, this old house. The paint is likely six layers thick, and already, the newest coat has faded from white to a dull, peeling ivory. The garden is thick and lush; he’s let the trees and grasses grow out because he likes the feeling of being surrounded by forest. His car is much nicer than the one his parents sat out front, although it’s still no Mercedes. He has what he needs, and for Will, that is enough.

It’s early that morning, on one of Will’s well-earned days off, when the car pulls up.

He’s just come off of a gruelling case that’s hollowed him out. He’ll come to get used to the fatigue, to the chronic migraines, but right now, the pulsating vein in his temple is making him eye the block of knives in the kitchen with hesitant desperation. He feels as though if only he could stick the blade into his head and crack the skull open, something black and toxic would bleed from him and the pressure would leave, and he could get a good night’s sleep –

But until that day, when his sanity lies in shreds, he’ll have to make do with aspirin and coffee. He’s on his second cup of the day by the sunrise, if you can count the mug he had when he resigned himself to insomnia at just past two. The caffeine probably doesn’t help him long-term, but it’s a quick fix and he’s all for those.

He sits on the porch, in his track-pants and grey shirt, clinging to him slightly with the thin sheen of sweat from his morning run, hands wrapped around the mug, calloused palms unaware of the scalding heat. The migraine kept him awake all night, but honestly, sleep’s not much easier at the moment-

_The sounds of scampering. Heavy breathing. Glance behind: nothing there. Running through snow, barefoot. The ice burns his feet. It’s closer. Can’t see it, but can feel it, that rancid breath on his neck –_

so he gets out of bed at four, runs the dogs down to the park, comes back as the sun rises, makes himself a coffee and sits out front with the beige folder. Work never leaves him, not on paper, not in sleep. It’s another fact he’s resigned to. He remembers that he can quit whenever he wants.

The car pulls up, and Will notices it immediately because not only does he know every vehicle on the street, but a Bentley sticks out like a sore thumb amongst the beaten-up Fords and disintegrating semi-detaches. He watches, with an eyebrow perked in intrigue, a man slide out from the driver’s seat and close the door behind him.

He’s tall, long-legged and broad, dressed in a three-piece suit, and holds himself well. Will wonders, when he seems to make his way to the old house next door, if he’s an estate agent.

The man pauses at the gate, and glances in Will’s direction instead. Perhaps he’s unsure he has the right house – they’re all as equally desecrated as one another around here. He starts to stride over.

“Good morning,” Will says, shielding his eyes from the sun and squinting up, “Are you trying to sell that place?” He nods towards the large house, now a light display of cracked, stained-glass window and overgrown wildflowers.

“No,” he replies, voice heavily accented, and his eyelashes and pale hair are almost translucent in the light, “I’ve come to collect some things.”

Will can’t believe his eyes when the clouds provide the two of them some relief from the bright light-

“Hannibal Lecter?” he half-asks, half-exclaims, recognising almost immediately the sharp cheekbones and maroon gaze, only a sharper, longer version of the teenage version of himself.

Hannibal smiles brilliantly. “Will Graham. It’s been a while, wouldn’t you say?”

Will chuckles, a staccato, disbelieving laugh. “You could say so. Twenty-something years?”

“I must have been.”

“I can’t believe it.”

“Neither can I.” Hannibal pauses, a sweeping glance gliding over Will who feels suddenly naked; the other’s gaze is almost searching, calculating. A heartbeat’s later, he adds, “I’m surprised you still live here.”

Will shrugs. “I tried moving away but nowhere was the same. Too close to main roads, too far from them; too expensive; no pets allowed-“

“You still have the dogs?” Hannibal asks, eyes glinting with sentimentality and something edgier.

“Not the original gang, but I’ve taken to collecting strays – here!” Will whistles and on cue, the pack gathers around the stranger, tails wagging excitedly. Hannibal chuckles, although remembering his suit on an after-note, takes a step back.

“How’s Mischa?” Will asks, watching contentedly as the dogs stop running circles around Hannibal and instead, all sit, almost expectantly, in front of him.

Hannibal’s expression changes, a chasm splitting his features. His thin lips tugs ever so minutely downwards, the light-pools in his scarlet eyes dim slightly. These are all things that Will wouldn’t notice if not for the empathy he despises so much. Hannibal glances up at Will, reaching out to gently brush the nose of one of the pack.

“I came to pick up some antiques that I think were left in the attic all those years ago,” he says, ignoring Will’s question. “Would you like to help me search? Afterwards I’d like to invite you over for dinner, if it’s alright by you; we have a bit to catch up on.”

Sensing the barrier, Will doesn’t press any further.

“If your cooking skills rival that of your mother’s, I’ll be impressed,” Will says, remembering the rare occasions on which Mrs Lecter would let the young ruffian into her house and treat him to roast lamb with garlic and rosemary, mint gravy, roast potatoes crisped with duck fat and sweet, crunchy cabbage. Hannibal grins as Will swims in nostalgia.

“I have a few tricks of my own,” he says.

It feels strange entering Hannibal’s old house by the front gate; Will feels almost compelled to scrape his knees against the sharp brick, land softly in a patch of moss trodden flat by his parkour. They walk into the garden, whose trees stand taller still, whose ground is littered thick with dead apples and pinecones which snap under their step, with wind-swept bluebells and the petite bunch of daisies growing through the cracks in the concrete pavestones, and maybe it’s just the wind brushing against the chimes which hang from the patio, but it sounds like Mischa’s tinkling laugh, carried on the breeze. Winter will come soon, and the flowers will die, but right now everything is eternal again, even if it’s only for a moment.


	4. Temptation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal Lecter is eighteen and Will Graham is fourteen. Although the moral onus lies with Hannibal, its presence is little more than a slight itch at the base of his skull.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a prompt for high school Hannigram from Gen (loki-shags-tony). Trigger warning for this chapter: Will is underage (it's in the summary) and there is no smut but there is mention of future sex which would be illegal. So don't read if those things offend or upset you.
> 
> Otherwise, enjoy! And a friendly reminder that I am always taking more prompts. Details are in the end notes.

“You have a habit of influencing me to make terrible decisions.”

The familiar voice makes Will grin from ear to ear. Hannibal leans up against the shed with him and wordlessly plucks the cigarette from Will’s nymphet lips, crushing it against the aluminium and dropping it to the ground.

“Hey!” Will cries, blowing smoke into Hannibal’s face as he does so –

_the older boy grimaces: it smells like rat poison-_

“What was that for!”

Hannibal watches the petulant frown crease Will’s features and he can’t help but smirk, pinching his petite chin. “Those things are terrible for your health. And they smell repugnant.”

Will snaps his head away from the older boy’s grasp, still pouting. “Whatever,” he dismisses, desperate to change the subject; “So what terrible decisions am I taking responsibility for now?”

“Firstly, this is the third time I’ve truanted on your account,” Hannibal says, holding up one finger.

“Secondly-” he waggles a second, “-it’s also, coincidentally, the second council meeting I’ve missed on your account.”

That makes Will’s eyes glitter mischievously. He wonders what kind of lies Hannibal told to get out of his head-boy duties so they could make out behind the toilets.

“These all sound like your decisions so far,” Will teases.

“You choose to take drugs once. After that, the addiction compels you,” he shrugs.

“Are you calling me a drug? That’s cliché even for you, Hannibal.”

Other than the cheeky creases at the corners of his eyes, Hannibal is otherwise dead-pan-  
“You haven’t let me get to number three yet,”-

“And thirdly?”

“Thirdly,” Hannibal holds up Finger Number Three, “You keep making me do this.”

Slender, pale fingers thread through Will’s unruly midnight mop and Will’s tongue flicks over his lips, plump but chapped, in breathless anticipation as the older boy leans in and kisses him. It’s a possessive kiss, the kind that leaves Will a little lightheaded, and finishes far too soon. The tact is clear: leave him wanting more. It’s effective. When Hannibal tries to pull away, Will grabs at the laurel of his blazer, crumbling the perfectly ironed pinstripes and revelling in the low growl that almost leaves Hannibal’s throat – part irritation, part arousal.

“You’re terrible,” Hannibal says, knocking Will’s hand away from him and straightening his blazer. The sun catches his breastful of awards and Will is momentarily blinded the sheen of brilliant gold.

Lightheaded, breathless and blind. Is Hannibal his boyfriend or a disease? Both, maybe. A sweet cocktail of the two.

“I’m terrible?” It’s meant to sound teasing and flirtatious, but most of the coy intention is lost in his breathless, boyish tone. “You’re supposed to be a role model for the easily influenced student masses. How would Professor Du Marier feel if she saw her star student kissing little boys behind bike sheds?”

The smirk framed by rosette cheeks, gaze liquid emerald but set deep under thick black lashes… funnily enough, what Will thinks is his mature seduction really makes him look the most tender and young. In this light he looks almost doll-like, and Hannibal wonders if there’s a perverse bass-note underlying the soft strings of his love for Will; only because in this soft light, with his features so young and feminine,  Hannibal’s heart beats a vengeance against his ribs. Sometimes it feels as though if you cracked open Hannibal’s chest, all you would find is splinters and dust.

He doesn’t mind one bit.

“I don’t kiss little boys behind bike sheds,” he corrects Will, unable to resist himself from brushing a finger along his sharp little jaw, “I kiss one, perfectly normal-sized boy behind bike sheds.”

***  
  
Hannibal Lecter is eighteen and Will Graham is fourteen. Although the moral onus lies with Hannibal, its presence is little more than a slight itch at the base of his skull. His mentors and peers when gazing upon the polished boy see only that: head boy Hannibal Lecter, polite, well-spoken, attractive and talented. They would never guess that behind his charismatic smile is what will later mature into an acidic loathing for them and their socio-opiate addled minds. Both Will and Hannibal, in growing up, have realised that they seem to exist on another plane to those around them; the only difference is that Will’s plane is skewed leftward, but Hannibal’s sees his as a vantage point from above. Consequently, the former rebels entirely, while the latter continues to play what he considers The Game. That is the beginning, and near end, of where they are separate.

Therefore, the normal rules of The Game are to Hannibal Lecter what the rules of _Go Fish_ are to all others: a means to a specific end, but otherwise inconsequential. That is not to say that he wants anybody to find out about his adolescent boyfriend – just that he has no moral qualms with spelling his name in breath against Will’s throat.

Will’s thought process is less complicated. He is completely enamoured by the boy behind the boy-mask named Hannibal Lecter, and the fact that their relationship is immoral is only an added bonus. He is simultaneously mature beyond his years and infantile, minty smoke and jealousy cemented in his foundations. He hates not being able to parade Hannibal around defiantly. Their first serious argument occurred when Hannibal refused to take him to his senior social – electing instead to have Alana Bloom, a fellow school captain made from flowers and saffron.

_“You don’t love me,” Will spits, shrugging away from Hannibal grasp._

_“No,” Hannibal agrees, “I don’t love you. It’s too dull a term. Do we love the sun-?”_

_Hannibal snakes his arms around Will’s waist and drags him back along the bed,_

_“I don’t want to hear your stupid poetry, Hannibal-”_

_Hannibal plucks the stolen cigarette from Will’s mouth but instead of putting it out, draws on it himself,_

_“-Nobody writes love poems for the sun for the simple fact that we would die without it. There is no need to declare emotion for something that knows your mere existence depends on it. That is proof enough.”_

_Hannibal never apologises outright, but in the smoke he breathes into Will’s lungs with a stolen kiss sits a_ sorry _of sorts. It’s good enough. Will grins into the kiss._

 

They haven’t had sex. That is strangely where Hannibal develops a conscience: sixteen is the arbitrary age in which he has promised Will sweet release, although that’s not to say that Will doesn’t do his damnedest to work the older boy up, hands skirting under soft-silk shirts as they kiss on Hannibal’s bed, occasionally working a tormented sigh from the other before his hands are stopped short of their southward traipse by an iron grip. His hands are placed safely on Hannibal’s hips, a safe layer from skin. It’s an abrupt and thus far, unexplained blip in Hannibal’s psyche, but on this one matter, Will doesn’t press further.

***

“My dad wants to invite you over for dinner,” Will says, fingers tracing lightly the back of Hannibal’s hand.

The older boy perks an eyebrow. “Oh really?”

Will smirks up, a mischievous expression reserved seemingly, only for Hannibal. “He wants to thank you for the tutoring. My marks have improved miraculously, you know.”

“Hmm. I think you chose to achieve better grades, just as you chose to let them slip.”

“Maybe you really have been helping me. Just not academically.” His eyes glitter.

“Maybe you’re simply a brat.”

Will pulls him into another kiss, this one deeper and more languid than the last… he feels a desperate need to memorise every crook and angle of Hannibal, in fear that one day, this boy

( _God, mirage_ )

will be snatched away from him.

“So you’ll come to dinner?” Will asks, finally breaking away after what feels like an eternity.

Hannibal smiles down at him softly, seeing his own evil glint reflected in those molten emeralds of Will’s. “Of course. I’d hate to be rude. And Mister Graham does make an excellent broth-”

“-hardly as good as yours.”

“- but Wolf’s Trapp is so far away from Baltimore. I’d have to leave terribly early to ensure a good night’s rest.”

Will bites his lower lip, leaving little teeth indents in the arid skin. It’s almost definitely a conscious act, but no less effective for it.

“I’ll just have to ask father if you can stay the night. I’m sure he won’t mind you using the guest bedroom.”

Hannibal’s resolve is an old brick wall and Will is water, a small continuous trickle slowly corroding him away.

“As long as I’m not intruding.”

Will thumbs the packet of cigarettes that sits in his pocket, a hard line against the grey polyester.

“I wouldn’t mind if you did.”

Hannibal, becoming more and more accustomed to defeat with every passing second in Will’s company, can’t help but card a hand through his hair, tangling his fingers in the thick curls. Will blinks up at him in faux innocence. Hannibal thinks that he ought to be illegal.

“I ought to get back to class,” Hannibal replies instead.

He kisses Will one more time, his hands resting on the boy’s hips, and Will, lost in the smoky cardamom of his lips, doesn’t even realise that Hannibal has stolen the cigarettes from his pocket until he’s halfway to the gates.


	5. Taking Prompts Again

Hey guys! Sorry to raise any false hopes but I just came back to this fic and decided I want to do some more! My Will Graham rp blog is ocdwillgraham (if you're an rper feel free to hmu!) and i'm now taking prompts again. Any pairing, any setting, any length, just tell me who, what and when, anonymous or not. Can't wait to hear what you guys want written. :)

**Author's Note:**

> To send me prompts, contact me on tumblr (clitorisvevo) or on gmail (ameliab193@gmail.com). As always, reviews are greatly appreciated! Enjoy :)


End file.
